Coordinator, BundesUmweltWettbewerb
Dr.
Marc Eckhardt
Biology Education
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+49-(0)431-880-1610
Much to celebrate at the BundesUmweltWettbewerb: Environmental projects honored with awards
The BundesUmweltWettbewerb (BUW), a competition that honors outstanding projects related to caring for the environment, held its annual awards ceremony on September 20, 2025, at the Natur- und Umweltschutz-Akademie in Recklinghausen in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. A total of four top prizes (Hauptpreise) – the highest category in the competition – went to projects based in the states of Baden-Württemberg, Hesse, and Saxony-Anhalt. Nine special prizes (Sonderpreise), the second highest category of award, were presented to projects from Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Bremen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, North Rhine-Westphalia, Saxony-Anhalt und Schleswig-Holstein.
Representatives of the award-winning projects in the thirty-fifth BundesUmweltWettbewerb, pictured after the presentation ceremony at the Natur- und Umweltschutz-Akademie NRW (NUA).
High-ranking figures from the public administration and environmental sectors had taken time out of their busy schedules to attend the ceremony, demonstrating their appreciation for the award-winning projects and the commitment shown by the participants in the BUW. Holger Voigt, a biologist and director of Geoscopia Umweltbildung, watched the participants being presented with their awards and delivered the celebratory keynote. Elke Reichert, head of North Rhine-Westphalia’s State Agency for Nature, Environment and Climate (LANUK), and Norbert Blumenroth, director of the Natur- und Umweltschutz-Akademie NRW (NUA), welcomed the attendees to the event, while Dr. Susanne Eich, deputy chair of the BUW I judging panel, and Prof. Dr. Gerrit Schüürmann, chair of the panel for BUW II, presented all the awards.
The thirty-fifth edition of the BUW saw the submission of 266 projects carried out by a total of 661 young people aged between 10 and 20, and proved once again the strength of upcoming generations’ interest in and commitment to engaging in innovative projects around crucial current issues relating to sustainable development and protecting the environment. Topics covered by the projects included climate change and its mitigation, saving resources, using alternative energies, and protecting species and water sources. Alongside the top and special prizes, the panels of judges awarded prizes for particularly promising ideas (Förderpreise) to eighteen projects, more than in any previous edition of the BUW.
We’d like to thank the members of the judging panels, the competition coordinators in each federal state, and everyone else involved in making the competition possible – their energy and commitment are big parts of what has made the BUW such a success.
The annual BundesUmweltWettbewerb honors young people who engage in projects with the aim of identifying the causes of environmental issues and tackling them with creativity and commitment in the spirit of the competition’s motto Vom Wissen zum nachhaltigen Handeln, roughly translatable as “Turning knowledge into sustainable action.” The Leibniz Institute for Science and Mathematics Education (IPN) in Kiel organizes and runs the BUW, which is supported by funds from the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space, and is recommended as an educational activity by the Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs of the Länder in the Federal Republic of Germany (KMK).
Find out more:
- You can access the 2024/2025 BUW press pack (in German), containing details of the competition and the award-winning projects, at https://www.scienceolympiaden.de/buw/mappen.
- Read (in German) about the BUW judging panels, those responsible for managing the competition in each federal state, and its funding sources on the BUW website: https://www.scienceolympiaden.de/buw.
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